Blended CAC Ratio

S&M expense attributable to new-customer acquisition divided by the new-customer CARR generated in the period. Per SMSB, the cleanest read on the new-logo acquisition engine's efficiency — strips out the expansion motion which has materially different unit economics. Common pitfall: failing to split AE comp time correctly between new and expansion activities — when the same AE owns both motions, an allocation rule (often the % of OTE tied to new-vs-expansion quota) is required and must be applied consistently quarter-over-quarter.

Fully-loaded S&M plus Customer Success expense attributable to expansion divided by expansion CARR generated in the period. Per SMSB, the efficiency read on the upsell / cross-sell / land-and-expand motion. Distinct from the new-logo CAC ratio because the cost base often includes CSMs whose primary metric is retention but whose secondary metric is expansion — boards expect to see that allocation called out. Common pitfall: excluding CS comp entirely understates the true cost of expansion; including all of CS overstates it. The SMSB standard prescribes a documented allocation rule (typically tied to expansion-quota OTE share).

Fully-loaded sales-and-marketing (S&M) expense incurred to acquire one new customer during the period. Per the SMSB standard, the CAC numerator includes salaries + commissions + benefits + travel + marketing programs + tooling — i.e. all S&M costs, not just direct-attribution paid acquisition. The denominator is new logos, not deals. Common pitfall: omitting fully-loaded comp (especially BDR/SDR base salary and CS-team cost-of-sale where they participate in expansion) understates CAC and inflates every downstream efficiency metric. The board cares about CAC alongside CAC Payback and the CAC Ratio family — single-number CAC is a building block, not a verdict.

Number of months required for the gross profit generated from a new customer's ARR to recover the fully-loaded S&M spend used to acquire them. The single most decision-useful efficiency metric at the board level — it directly connects acquisition cost, ACV, and gross margin into one "how long until we break even on this customer" answer. Per the SMSB standard, the calculation must use gross-margin-adjusted ARR in the denominator (not raw ARR) to be cross-company comparable. Common pitfall: using raw ARR understates payback by ~25–30 percentage points and breaks comparability with peer benchmarks.

Annualized recurring revenue booked from net-new logos (first-time customers) during the period. This is the "hunt" line of the ARR waterfall — the output of the new-customer acquisition motion, distinct from expansion (existing-customer upsell) and from churn / downgrades. Common pitfall: counting renewals or expansion deals as new business inflates the new-logo conversion engine and hides a stalled acquisition motion. The KpiVarianceTable widget shows period forecast vs actual; downstream views compare it to S&M spend to derive new-business CAC and CAC payback.

Annualized recurring revenue added during the period from existing customers — through upsell (more seats / higher tier), cross-sell (additional products), or price increases. The "farm" line of the ARR waterfall. Boards read this as the leading indicator that product-market fit has translated into product-account fit and that the post-sale motion is creating compound growth. Common pitfall: classifying contractual price-step-ups (CPI escalators baked into the original contract) as expansion overstates new selling motion. Expansion CAC Ratio and Net Revenue Retention are derived from this number.